Read Online How Best to Avoid Dying by Owen Egerton - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Owen Egerton
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Something challenging, repulsive, and awesome.
You laugh, but I could smell the mediocrity of your life as soon as you passed through the automatic doors. Itâs stinking up my store. You work some job you donât like, holding your breath for eight hours a day. You spend your free time on eating, TV, and sleep, or looking for someone to eat with, watch TV with, and sleep with. But I donât sleep. Iâm awake. Your soul is as soft and pasty as my skin. But my soul is as sharp and cool as the silver caps on your rotting teeth.
Sorry. Sorry.
Not appropriate.
But you will keep coming back. You will keep checking, seeing if Iâm still here. Youâll try odd hours, and you will always find me. You will ask me math questions and my favorite colors trying to discern which half is at the helm. Some days you wonât talk. Every now and then youâll buy something, a Slim Jim, perhaps, or a sugar-free Rockstar Energy Drink. You will linger. A little longer each visit. Youâll eye the adult diapers. Your skin will change like mine. You will forget to go home. Forget how to go home. Finally, you will come to me and ask for an application for employment, maybe a stocking job in the back. And I will give you one. Because weâre always open. Always.
Here is your change. Here is your purchase. Thank you for shopping with us. Come again.
LICORICE: A STORY FOR JOHN ERLER 1
Zane Bellows: a natural pop star sensation. He was six feet tall with hair that spiked up like flames from a grease fire. He could reach his lanky arm up through the branches of musical composition and pluck the ripest, sweetest little tune, the kind of melody that youâd hear and think, âWhy wasnât that written before?â Heâd add some reasonably inspired lyrics and find himself with another hit, songs like âFruit Fly in Your Eyeâ and âIâm Stoned and Voting.â
But in the fall of 1986, Zane Bellows outdid himself. He and his band the Sea Elephants began recording Licorice , themost ambitious album of rock history. 2 In a time of pop and plastic, the band set out to create starlight and ambrosia.
It began with pain.
Zane Bellows broke his toe on Lane Ropeâs mislaid bass as the bandâs tour bus barreled through Austin, Texas. The pain burst from the toe up the leg like oil from an old-fashioned oil drill.
The emergency roomâs younger nurses squealed when they saw Zane draped between Polk and Shelly Wallenhump, lead guitar. The older nurses had Zane replace his leather jacket and pants with a short gown that felt and looked like paper towels.
One nurse gave him a generous dose of Vicodin and left him in a quiet room to recoup. The neat little narcotic started in his head and slowly floated downward, like those thick fogs heâd left in San Francisco, hiding the pain as it went, down his neck, sinking into his stomach, descending along his leg and welling up in the toe. It didnât stop the pain as much as covered it and made it less important.
Zane was always an explorer, always restless to see what was around the corner. He was alone for fewer than ten minutes before leaving his bed and heading into the clean smelling halls, his bare feet slapping against the cool floor, his happy ass smiling sideways at anyone caring to look.
While walking, Zane glimpsed into the rooms of other patients. He saw cancer, dying hearts, and broken bones. He tried to magnify the pain of his toe so he could relate to the pain of these others. Vicodin was working against him. He couldnât quite empathize, but he wanted to.
Through one of those windows, Zane Bellows saw a woman. She was tall, almost Zaneâs height. She had slouching shoulders and a thin waist. A bright blue top loosely curtained her chest and a lime colored skirt rested on her hips.
Her hair was straight and brown, the shade of oak-bark, and she had ghost white skin that was covered with a light white fuzz. Her
You laugh, but I could smell the mediocrity of your life as soon as you passed through the automatic doors. Itâs stinking up my store. You work some job you donât like, holding your breath for eight hours a day. You spend your free time on eating, TV, and sleep, or looking for someone to eat with, watch TV with, and sleep with. But I donât sleep. Iâm awake. Your soul is as soft and pasty as my skin. But my soul is as sharp and cool as the silver caps on your rotting teeth.
Sorry. Sorry.
Not appropriate.
But you will keep coming back. You will keep checking, seeing if Iâm still here. Youâll try odd hours, and you will always find me. You will ask me math questions and my favorite colors trying to discern which half is at the helm. Some days you wonât talk. Every now and then youâll buy something, a Slim Jim, perhaps, or a sugar-free Rockstar Energy Drink. You will linger. A little longer each visit. Youâll eye the adult diapers. Your skin will change like mine. You will forget to go home. Forget how to go home. Finally, you will come to me and ask for an application for employment, maybe a stocking job in the back. And I will give you one. Because weâre always open. Always.
Here is your change. Here is your purchase. Thank you for shopping with us. Come again.
LICORICE: A STORY FOR JOHN ERLER 1
Zane Bellows: a natural pop star sensation. He was six feet tall with hair that spiked up like flames from a grease fire. He could reach his lanky arm up through the branches of musical composition and pluck the ripest, sweetest little tune, the kind of melody that youâd hear and think, âWhy wasnât that written before?â Heâd add some reasonably inspired lyrics and find himself with another hit, songs like âFruit Fly in Your Eyeâ and âIâm Stoned and Voting.â
But in the fall of 1986, Zane Bellows outdid himself. He and his band the Sea Elephants began recording Licorice , themost ambitious album of rock history. 2 In a time of pop and plastic, the band set out to create starlight and ambrosia.
It began with pain.
Zane Bellows broke his toe on Lane Ropeâs mislaid bass as the bandâs tour bus barreled through Austin, Texas. The pain burst from the toe up the leg like oil from an old-fashioned oil drill.
The emergency roomâs younger nurses squealed when they saw Zane draped between Polk and Shelly Wallenhump, lead guitar. The older nurses had Zane replace his leather jacket and pants with a short gown that felt and looked like paper towels.
One nurse gave him a generous dose of Vicodin and left him in a quiet room to recoup. The neat little narcotic started in his head and slowly floated downward, like those thick fogs heâd left in San Francisco, hiding the pain as it went, down his neck, sinking into his stomach, descending along his leg and welling up in the toe. It didnât stop the pain as much as covered it and made it less important.
Zane was always an explorer, always restless to see what was around the corner. He was alone for fewer than ten minutes before leaving his bed and heading into the clean smelling halls, his bare feet slapping against the cool floor, his happy ass smiling sideways at anyone caring to look.
While walking, Zane glimpsed into the rooms of other patients. He saw cancer, dying hearts, and broken bones. He tried to magnify the pain of his toe so he could relate to the pain of these others. Vicodin was working against him. He couldnât quite empathize, but he wanted to.
Through one of those windows, Zane Bellows saw a woman. She was tall, almost Zaneâs height. She had slouching shoulders and a thin waist. A bright blue top loosely curtained her chest and a lime colored skirt rested on her hips.
Her hair was straight and brown, the shade of oak-bark, and she had ghost white skin that was covered with a light white fuzz. Her
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